xiv, 578 pages : 25 cm

Shows how analogy-making pervades human thought at all levels, influencing the choice of words and phrases in speech, providing guidance in unfamiliar situations, and giving rise to great acts of imagination

"Analogy is the core of all thinking. This is the simple but unorthodox premise that Pulitzer Prize-winning author Douglas Hofstadter and French psychologist Emmanuel Sander defend in their new work. Hofstadter has been grappling with the mysteries of human thought for over thirty years. Now, with his trademark wit and special talent for making complex ideas vivid, he has partnered with Sander to put forth a highly novel perspective on cognition. We are constantly faced with a swirling and intermingling multitude of ill-defined situations. Our brain's job is to try to make sense of this unpredictable, swarming chaos of stimuli. How does it do so? The ceaseless hail of input triggers analogies galore, helping us to pinpoint the essence of what is going on. Often this means the spontaneous evocation of words, sometimes idioms, sometimes the triggering of nameless, long-buried memories."--Dust jacket

Includes bibliographical references (pages 535-555) and index

Analogy as the core of cognition -- The evocation of words -- The evocation of phrases -- A vast ocean of invisible analogies -- Abstraction and inter-category sliding -- How analogies manipulate us -- How we manipulate analogies -- Naïve analogies -- Analogies that shook the world -- Katy and Anna debate the core of cognition

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